User blog:ImagineMan/I Quit
Sorry guys, I am leaving this project. I have my reasons, which are explained below, but before I start, I want you to know that these are just my opinions. This message is not to be taken offensively and I am not trying to beat up on anyone. I tried my best to be as kind in my remarks as I could. This blog was simply made to state my opinions and explain my resignation, so please do not get mad at me because that is not why I typed this. With that said, let us being with the first reason: Wrong Focus First off, the current focus is, in my opinion, wrong. Right now the team's main focus has been towards the logo design and LDD's. I could be wrong because I haven't used the live chat being in Thailand, but all the edits and user activity has been towards that. Let me further explain this in an allegory: Bob's favorite resturant, the Brick Building of Burgers, just closed. For a long time he was very upset until he thought of a wonderful idea: he could make his own resturant. So he hurries along, grabbing people to help him fulfill his dream. He finds many people on the street and hires them right away. Already he has great ideas, and his employees work on the menus and decorations. There is arguing here and there, but they are busy. But a month later, a news reporter comes and asks to try some of the food. Unfortunately, Bob didn't have any burgers to server the reporter. He and his employees had been so focused on the appearance that they had beautiful menus, fancy decorations, and a sparkling neon sign in front stating their name "Brick BBQ Burgers." Yet they didn't have any hamburger meat, buns, or toppings. In fact, they had no food at all. Lately the team seems to be busy with the logo and users have been making LDD's and amazing missions. Yet I doubt we have any coding to make it all happen, because if this is going to be a game, the coding is the most important. Even Allenation has more of a game than this team because he already made a user model and coin. He has already gotten more code than us. While what we are doing right now is great, coding should be our top priority since all this art is noting if there is no game to put it on. There is no reason to have a resturant without any burgers. As a side note, if this game is going to be private, why have a logo in the first place? I mean, logos are very cool and all, but if only about 30 people will be able to play the game, only 30 people will see the logo. Logos are used to identify a legal entity or company. When you see the Lego logo, right away you know it is Lego and you instatly remember all the great (or not so great) things about it. When you see Coca-Cola, you know it isn't some off-brand or conterfeit, you know it is the real thing. In this circumstance, a logo is really just to "look cool." Lego Can do Better Most of us know that Lego is making more Massively Multiplayer Online Games that will be released next year. It is also very likely more console games will be released. The thing is, Lego is better at making games than us. Sorry if you think I am wrong, but it is true. This whole wiki is made up of a bunch of LU fans, and we all know how great Lego Universe was. Lego took about 4 to 5 YEARS making Lego Universe, one of the best games ever. Even if you think the new games are going to be childish or stupid or not as good as LU, it will probably be better than anything any small group of Lego fans could make in the same time. I am sorry if I hurt anyone's feelings, but do you really believe in one year we could make a game better than Lego? Lego has paid experts making these games, and perhaps hundreds compared to our smaller number, who are mostly amateurs when compared to the Lego Gaming Staff. You can even look at project B.U.I.L.D., which has some very experienced game makers in the Lego community. They have been busy for about a year, yet they haven't gone anywhere close to the amazing gameplay of Lego Universe. They have done an amazing job, but Lego still beat them, and I believe Lego will do better than us, too. I would rather wait for a year for a complete Lego game than work on coding a game for a year that will be nowhere as developed as a Lego game. Disorganised As I said before, it has been a month. I may not be the most active user on this team, but being the only coder who has applied, I thought someone would have assigned me a project, but no, I haven't been told to do anything. All I needed was someone to say, "Hey ImagineMan, we all agreed that the beginning is where you wake up in a statis pod, with a broken room all around you. You break the lid off the pod and go explore a bit, picking up a rusty old key that opens this banged up door, where you will enter the next level." Or even more simpler: "Make us a player model so we can start making skins that we can apply to it and we can have something that moves." But unfortunately, I haven't gotten any of that. I know this team is very new and it is constantly getting more and more organised, but I thought by a month someone would tell me what is going on. I still don't understand the goal of this project completely. I only know that is going to a private game recreating Lego Universe. Yet honestly, I think that is a bit broad because we don't have enough experience to make everything in LU. We should start small. Perhaps we will exclude the building part for now and just focus on the battling and exploring of worlds. Or perhaps, like B.U.I.L.D., we will focus just on a form of building engine. Also, some of the members aren't really that active. A few of them just asked to be Masters so they could play the game. I doubt they plan to do that much for actually making the game a reality. Now please, if you did sign up as a Master and do plan to help out the game before and after it is released, please do not get mad at me. I am not saying everyone did this, but I think some did because some are not that active it looks like. They just signed up and haven't done much since. The other thing is there isn't enough focus on coding and some of the job titles are not needed right now. Fortunately, BlueJay has done a great job at reinventing this area, and jobs such as "Game Trailer Creator" are gone. I mean really, do we need to make a CGI trailer before we make a game that only 30 people will get to play? However, I still do believe that more focus should be in the application. Before, someone could simply say "I will be a mythran cause I can help," and they would get admitted in. Really, it should be better, where a user has to show some of their work and explain why they want to join this team, etc. etc. Fortunately, I believe BlueJay is working on this so that is very good. Not Fit For This Team When I first say the blog post, I was skeptical because I thought Lego would sue this game right when it got in Alpha Phase. However, while I was still worried, I joined because I thought space was limited, joining was hard, and that this game would work. That is why I listed as many skills as I could think of: like a very messy resume--suprisingly I got every job I listed. However, when I look at this, this team is not for me. For one thing, I have lost interest in Fan-Made Lego Projects. When the blog post first popped up, I was very enthusiastic, but now that time has gone by, I have had time to think. I would rather wait for Lego to make a game than build one not even half as good. While this game is young, I don't see it succeeding unless some big decisions are made. Now don't get me wrong, this team could succeed, but many others have failed before. If the right path is chosen and if everyone works very hard, this could be a great game. Unfortunately, at the moment I don't see that happening, especially since there aren't any coders are anything. Do not be offended, but this wiki is just a place to discuss what the game should look like: deciding the logo, making LDD's, writing up Missions; when instead there should be an actual game to apply all these ideas to. I am also very busy. Right now I run a Minecraft server which is soon going to start earning me around $50 a month, so a lot of focus is towards that. Also, I am making mods, such as a LU Sound mod. But more importantly, I am busy in real life. I spend time with my family, work on my Lego City, build NXTs while I await the EV3. I have hours of work to do and am in the process of moving across the Atlantic Ocean. Unfortunately, I don't have anymore time to give to this team. I must prioritize, and making a Lego Fan MMO is on the bottom. Even if I did stay, I doubt I would be much use. It would be very hard for me to be active, and even that little time wouldn't be that helpful. The skill you would want most is coding. It is true that it is my best skill I listed, but I am still young in my study of the language of computers. I am nowhere near experienced enough to create a game. I may have created a decryption code with Java, but making a game is a different story. Could I learn? Yes, but it would not come fast, not fast enough for this game. I suggest you find other coders that are more experienced in creating games than I am: you will need them. Final Notes Thank you for reading my very long list of reasons why I am leaving. I hope you know understand why I made this decision. Please remember I did not try to hurt anyone's feelings in this blog. I simply stated what my opinions are and tried my best not to offend anyone. Also understand that I am not condemning this game to failure. With some changes and a lot of work this could be an amazing game. However, right now I warn you that it is going to crumble apart unless such changes are made. So this is my farewell to all of you, people I hardly know. I may pop back up a few times, giving you advice and maybe doing a little help here and there, but for the most part I am gone for good. Goodbye, Lego World team. I wish you great success in this large undertaking you are tackling. : "Imagination never ends!" Category:Blog posts